to keep costs down. now that factory is closed and cass is making more money by giving up most of those big deals. for more, watch your business sunday mornings at 7:30 on msnbc. i promised you the president of the united states and he's here. let's play "hardball." ♪ >> it's my honor to introduce the president of the united states. >> well, thank you, mr. president.

thank you, dr. kneel kirwin for having us today. what brought you to "hardball"? >> american university. [ applause ]. "hardball" was just an excuse to hang out with these fine young people. you know, i've had just wonderful experiences here. the first time i spoke here actually was when i was running for the presidency. and ted kennedy announced his endorsement here. obviously he's an incredible friend. spoke here about immigration. i always have a wonderful interaction with the young people here. they're doing a great job. >> well, let's play "hardball". >> let's do it. >> you have a great audience, college-aged students and some faculty. there's resistance among young people to enrolling in the exchanges and taking responsibility for their health care. what's your argument why they

should do that? >> well, first of all, i understand why people would be resistant to going on a website that wasn't working right. take a look for yourself. most college students, because of the law, can't stay on their parents's plan. and your first job where you don't have full health insurance benefits may mean that you stay on your parents's plan a little bit longer. but at some point, say when you turn 26, if you're between jobs or you've got a passion, you want to start a business and you're not going to have health insurance, this gives you the opportunity to get high quality health insurance. and for most people under 30

it's probably going to cost you less than your cell phone bill or your cable bill. less than 100 bucks. and there was a time when i looked healthy like these folks and thought i was never going to get sick. but what you discover is that some tough stuff happens. you have a run of bad luck. you suddenly need hospitalization. you have an accident. you get an illness. and for young people to recognize that it is in their financial interest and their health interest to be able to get ongoing preventive care, to be able to get free contraception, and benefits that -- like mammograms that allow them to maintain their heating throughout their lives without fear of going bankrupt or making their family bankrupt if they get sick, that's something that's priceless. and i think most people will recognize that. so my advice to everybody is the

website is now working. go to healthcare.gov. take a look for yourself in your state what's available to you. there's no reason why you should not have health insurance. by the way, if you don't get health insurance and you get in an accident, the rest of us end up paying for it. they end up charging about $1,000 in hidden subsidies for the people who don't have health insurance. so that's what we're trying to eliminate. >> a story about the national security agency basically patrolling all the cell phones in the world basically. a lot of young people point to privacy requirements. they don't like being part of anything that's collecting information. health care, is this going to be one of the detriments to people signing up. >> first of all, health care is entirely different. it's more like seniors who sign up for medicare or people who

file their taxes. it's protected. it's governed by a whole series of laws. you're right. young people rightly are sensitive to the needs to preserve their privacy and to maintain internet freedom. by the way, so am i. that's part of not just our first amendment rights, they spend so much time texting and instagrami instagraming. something is coming up every single day. and so all of us spend more and more of our lives in cyberspace. now, the challenge is, first of all, we do have people trying to hurt us. and they communicate through these same systems. if we're going to do a good job preventing a terror attack, a

weapon of mass destruction getting on to the new york subway system, et cetera, we do want to keep eyes on some bad actors. the second thing is that the same cyberspace that gives us all this incredible information and allows us to reach out around the world also makes our bank accounts vulnerable. cyber crime is a huge problem and a growing problem. so we've got to be in there in some way to help protect the american people even as we're also making sure that the government doesn't abuse it. now i can't confirm or get into the the details of every aspect of what the nsa does. and the way this has been reported, the snowden disclosures have identified areas of legitimate concern. some of it has also been highly sensationalized. and, you know, has been painted in a way that's not accurate.

i've said before and i will say again, the nsa actually does a very good job about not engaging in domestic surveillance. not reading people's e-mails. not listening into the content of their phone calls. outside of our borders, the nsa is more aggressive. it's not constrained by laws. part of what we're trying to do the next month or so is having done an independent review, brought in civil libertarians, i'll be proposing some self restraint on the nsa. to initiate reforms that can give people more confidence. but i want everybody to be clear. the people of the nsa generally are looking out for the safety of the american people. they are not interested in reading your e-mails. they are not interested in reading your text messages.

and that's not something that's done. we've got a big system of checks and balances including the courts and congress who have the the capacity to prevent that from happening. >> let's look at confidence and trust in government. 50 years ago, in june of 1963, president john f. kennedy spoke here at the american university. >> our problems are man made. therefore, they can be solved biff man. and man can be as big as he wants. no problem of human destiny is beyond human beings. man's reason and spirit have all consoled the seemingly unsolvable. and we believe they can do it again. >> how do we get back to that confidence that we can solve our man made problems with other problems? >> well, you know, i have that confidence. we've gone through a tough time

the last five years. most of the young people who are here today have come of age during as difficult a period as we have seen in our modern history. we went through the worst financial crisis since the great depression. we have gone through wars. this is part of the 9/11 generation. who was very young at the time but remembers the trauma of that event. yet if you look at it, we now have ended the war in iraq. we're about to end the war in afghanistan. the job market is getting better. our economy is improveth. we have double our production of clean energy, doubled our production of traditional energy sources. we are on the brink of being

energy independent as a country our size to be. we have the best researchers, scientists on earth, and the most innovative companies on earth. we're still the envy of the world. i continue to have great confidence in our capacity. this city washington is grid locked and spends too much time worried about the next election and not enough worried about the next generation. what jack kennedy understood as well. that's the american people. we go through these periods where our politics gets all balanced up. the truth is sometimes we're

nostalgic about the past. >> i am. >> i know you are. if over and over again they see they are not addressing the core problems we have, eventually they will put in place folks who are serious about getting the work done. >> let's talk about the problem with the legislative branch. the nature of america is an aisle down the center. those aisles have always been there. rarely have we had one party in power a year or two. are we stalk with this as long as we have two parties running our government. they can't compromise. they used to compromise. in the old days they would

compromise and blame others for the ones they didn't like. today they don't and blame the other party. strike a deal and blame boehner for the parts you don't like and he can blame you for the parts he doesn't like. >> well, a couple of things. first of all -- >> compromise. >> i think it's fair to say i have always been prepared to not only negotiate but to go ahead and push forward on principals and compromises. sometimes on your station msnbc i've been blasted for being too willing to compromise. objectively i think you can look and you can see that the big challenge is you have a faction of the republican party that sees compromise as a dirty word that has moved so far to the

right that it will be difficult for ronald reagan to win the nomination at this point. and as a consequence it is more challenging. but a couple of things i want to point out. >> but you have three and a half more years to deal with this situation. >> first of all, in our history, usually when we have made big progress on issues it has been when one party controlled the government for a period of time. the big strides we made in the new deal, the big strides with the great society, those were times when you had a big majority. when ronald reagan made changes in the direction of a more republican agenda was when he had a majority. what you're right about is when we have divided government, most of the time there's about 70%, 80% overlap. we're not like some companies where you have a specialist

party on one hand and ultra conservative on the other hand. so my argument to boehner and mcconnell is let's go ahead and have arguments on the things we disagree about. let's work on the things we do agree about. a classic example is immigration reform. we have both democrats and republicans voting for a common sense bill that would strengthen our borders, fix the legal iimmn system, that would hold companies hiring in hiring undocumented workers and taking advantage of them. oh, by the way, we will deal with the 11 million people in the shadows right now.

the majority of the american people think it's a good idea and republicans who think it's a good idea. the only thing that's stopping it at this point is what i mentioned earlier, a faction in the house republican party that is resistant. >> well, i think that there's so much focus on the politics of the base, and republicans being worried about getting challenged during the primary season that that inhibits a lot of cooperation that is there. and i actually think there's a bunch of republican who is want to get stuff done. they've got to be embarrassed. the truth of the matter is they've now been in charge of the house of representatives, one branch -- or one chamber in one branch of government for a couple of years now. they just don't have a lot to show for it. >> let's talk about the executive branch which you control.

back in 1964, we looked it up, a pew study, 76% of the american people believed that most of the time almost always the federal government did the right thing. now it's down to less than 20%. the trust question. the commitments you made before the rollout with health care. what is it? it's a serial decline, mr. president. it keeps going down. what's going to stop it, arrest that decline? of you being honest, anybody who's president, there's skepticism out there. >> the cynicism and skepticism is deep. and i distinguish between, you know, just management of government and the basic blocking and tackling of getting stuff done to help the american people. and then the ability to move big

policy changes that are going to help more americans. when it comes to the management of government, part of the reason people are so skeptical is that when we do things right, they don't get a lot of attention. if we do something that is perceived at least initially as a screwup, it will be on the nightly news for a week. let's take the example of the federal emergency management agency. fema. we've got a guy who's been in charge, craig fugate, who has managed as many natural disasters over the last five years as just about anybody and has done a flawless job. >> so he's really doing a good job. not like his predecessor. >> he's doing a heck of a job. and that's not just my opinion. that's the opinion of every governor and mayor that works with him.

including republicans. nobody knows who this guy is. and if, in fact, we go in after sandy or after the tornadoes in oklahoma or missouri and were helping people effectively and quickly and they're getting what they need, nobody hears about that. that's not something that's reported about. if on the other hand you've got an office in cincinnati in the irs office that i think for bureaucratic reasons is trying to streamline what is a difficult law to interpret about whether tax exemption and they've got a list. >> it's tricky. >> by the way, chris, i'll point out there's some so-called progressives and you know

perceived to be liberal commentators who during that week just were outraged at the possibility that these folks, you know, had been at the direction of the democratic party in some way discriminated against tea party folks. you know, that is what gets news. that's what gets attention. now, here's what i will say. there are a couple million people working for the federal government. i remember bob gates, my former secretary of defense wonderful public servant, when i first came in i asked him so bob you got any advice for me. he said mr. president, just understand you've got a lot of people working for you. somebody somewhere at this very moment is screwing something up. and that's true. and so i have to consistently push on every cabinet secretary on every single agency how can we do things better? and we can do things better. part is we need to reorganize the government which was

designed primarily in 1935 or '45. we could consolidate agencies. we've got to do a better job buying information technologies. how we make ourselves more customer friendly. those are all things that we can improve. but the upshot is the government still does a lot of good. the last point i'll make on this is we've had a politics, frankly, the entire republican party brand since ronald reagan has been government's the problem. and if you day after day, week after week, election after election are running on that platform, and that permeates our culture and it's picked up by ordinary citizens who grow skeptical, then it's not surprising that over time trust in government declines. but as i said in a speech yesterday, the biggest issue

that i see out on the horizon is how do we make sure an economy works for everybody and that every one of these young people can get a good job, pursue a career, support a family, not be loaded up by a hundred thousand dollars worth of debt. actually buy a home. how do we do those things that reduce inequality in our society and broaden opportunity? and government can't solve all of that, and we live in an economy that is global and technological and is changing faster than ever before in history, but government can't stand on the sidelines when we're doing that. and without some faith in our capacity for collective action, those trends are going to get worse. so we've got to -- and the young people in particular have to understand government is us. government's not somebody else. government's us.

we have the capacity to change it. voters have the capacity to change it. members of congress do as well as the president. >> let's talk about the chief executive, you. and let's talk about a lot of these young people came here to study government. there's all kinds of theories of how to be president of the united states. there's the spokes of the wheel method which kennedy used where he had direct contact with everybody all the time. then there was the strong chief of staff. the military command system of general eisenhower as president. and ronald reagan did it with a great chief of staff, a strong one jim baker. what concern -- zeke emanuel said the other day there should have been one assigned by you to oversee the rollout of health care. and there wasn't. when secretary sebelius appeared in that hearing and was asked by marcia blackburn, who's in charge, it took her awhile to answer. and she final got to the cms. but it didn't seem like there was a top-down authority system from you. let's look forward.

do you have a relationship with your cabinet that they follow through and execute as you envision they should or do you you work through a coup. what is your system for management? >> well, first of all i think it's important to distinguish between this particular health care project where it is obvious that we needed additional controls in place, because it didn't deliver on time the way we wanted. and how we've managed incredibly complex problems for the last five years. everything from wars to pandemics to, you know, natural disasters to expanding student loans for young people. generally speaking, my theory has been number one that yes i've got a strong chief of staff but i'm holding every cabinet member accountable and want to have direction with them. number two is i have an open door policy where i want people bringing me bad news on time so we can fix things.

and the challenge, i think, that we have going forward is not so much my personal management style or particular issues around white house organization. it has to do with what i referred to earlier which is we had these big agencies, some of which are outdated. some of which are not designed properly. we've got, for example, 16 different agencies that have some responsibility to help businesses large and small in all kinds of ways. whether it's helping to finance them, helping them to export. and so if you're a small

business person getting started, you may think you need to go to the small business administration on one thing. you've got to go to commerce on another. we've proposed let's consolidate a bunch of that stuff. the challenge we've got is that that requires a law to pass. and frankly there is a lot of members of congress who are chair of a particular committee. over certain aspects of certain policies. but this is going to be a major focus and has been over the last five years, but going forward over the next three years, how do we have a 21st century federal government? and this is part of the reason why people are skeptical. there are just some things people have an interaction with the federal government where we could be doing a much better job. some of them aren't federal. everybody has the experience of trying to get their driver's license. it takes a long time. you know, why do you have to do a written driving test if you already have your license? i mean, there are just a whole bunch of things we could be

using with the internet and new communication systems. and the more we can just reorganize the guts of how these agencies work, the easier it's going to be. because the white house is just a tiny part of what is a huge widespread organization with increasingly complex tasks in a complex world. >> let me ask you about something else. this is a twitter question from c. wilhelms. what can we do to stop the gop from rigging the votes state by state to disenfranchise voters and destroy our democracy? 36 states right now led by republican legislatures have been trying to make it difficult for minority people to vote in big cities and older people. everybody knows the game. republicans often admit the game to deny people the vote. what's your reaction?

>> well, couple of things. you saw the lines we had not only in '08 but in '12. some of these folks may have stood in line. i said on election night that's not acceptable in a democracy. that has been around as long as ours and the world looks to. so we immediately assigned by chief election lawyer and mitt romney's chief election lawyer to sit down with a group of experts and come up with a whole series of voter reforms. they're supposed to report back to me by the end of this year so early next year we're going to put forward what we know will be a bipartisan effort or a bipartisan proposal to encourage people to vote. you can't say you take pride in american democracy, american constitutionism, american exceptionalism. so i think there's some common sense things we can do and i won't preview the proposals because i haven't gotten them yet. keep in mind, though, for all the efforts that have been made and some of them, by the way, may be illegal. may violate the voting rights

act even after the supreme court's recent ruling. and our justice department is going to be staying on them. if we have evidence that you have mechanisms that are specifically designed to discriminate against certain groups of voters, then the justice department will come down on them and file suit. the one point i want to make, though, is even with all the efforts that were made in the last election, folks still voted. and if people feel engaged enough and have a sense of a stake in our democracy, you know, you'll be able to vote. and our biggest problem right now is not the misguided efforts of some of these state legislatures. our bigger problem is the one you alluded to earlier which is people in government can make a difference. we still have about 40% of the

population that's eligible to vote that chooses to opt out. they're not being turned away at the polls. they're turning themselves away from the polls. and that's something that we've got to get at. and young people in particular have a tendency to vote during presidential years. and then just are not excited at all during midterms. these midterm elections in many ways are more important because that's what's going to determine who's in charge of congress. and you may agree with me or disagree with me, but don't think it all ends with me. it's also important who's the speaker of the house and who's in charge of the senate. and i hope young people increasingly understand that. >> government dysfunction is now the number one concern even b more than the economy. thank you, mr. president. we'll be back with more with president obama from american university. you're watching the "hardball" college tour from american university. >> there is the united states of america.

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>> hey there. a spokesman for new mexico state police said the officer who fired his gun on a mom in a mini van with her kids is out of a job. joined by the first family,

president obama lit the national christmas tree on a rainy friday evening in washington. i'm veronica de la cruz. ♪ i stand before you today to announce my candidacy for president of the united states of america. >> this is going to be remembered as one great day in american politics when barack obama with an american mother and a kenyan father, a graduate of the harvard law school, the president of the harvard law review, a senator in just his second year of office runs for president of the united states and is already the number two candidate. >> we're back at the "hardball"

college tour at american university. your remarks the other day was so resonant on what the holy father pope francis has been saying. talk about that. the belief we have a social responsibility, a moral responsibility to look out for people who haven't made it in this country. >> yeah. there's no great religion that doesn't speak to this. at root, every great religion has some equivalent of the golden rule, some equivalent of the idea that i am my brother's keeper and my sister's keeper. some notion that even as we each take individual responsibility for acting in a responsible and righteous way, part of our obligation is to the larger world. and to future generations. you know, i think pope francis

is showing himself to be just an extraordinarily thoughtful and soulful messenger of peace and justice. i haven't had a chance to meet him yet. but everything that i've read, everything that i've seen from him indicates the degree to which he is trying to remind us of those core obligations. and as i said in my speech yesterday, we live in a economy that is the greatest generator of wealth in history. we're risk takers, we're entrepreneurs, and we're rugged individuals. that's part of what makes us great. that's why we continue to be a magnet for strivers from all around the world. they think i'm not going to be held back by conventions and traditions. i'm going to go out there and i'm going to make it. and we want to maintain that

sense of character. but what i always remind people is that what also built this country was a sense of community. and a sense of common endeavor. so whether it was building the transcontinental railroad or sending a man to the moon or helping to create the internet or curing diseases, we always understood that there's some things we do better together. and that we should take pride as a nation in our ability to work in concert. and if, in fact, we are helping to assure that that kid over there who's not my kid has a chance at a good education or that guy over there who i'm not related to has a chance at a decent job and a decent retirement, i'm going to be better off. i'm going to be living in a society that is more cohesive and is going to create the kind of future for our kids that were

all want. and that more than anything is at the core of the debate that i've been having with the republican party over the last several years. it's not just the details of the affordable care act or, you know, the minimum wage. because as i said yesterday in the speech, if you've got better ideas for achieving the same goal, put them out there. i'm not wedded to one particular way of doing things. but the central argument i have is we do have an obligation to each other. and there's some things we can do together. in fact, the big challenges we have whether it's immigration, climate change, an economy that works for everybody, improving our education system, making

college more affordable, competing in the world economy, dealing with questions of war and peace, those are not things that chris matthews or barack obama can solve by ourselves. by necessity we're going to have to do those together. and if we can at least agree on that and agree that our system of self-government allows us to come together to take on those big problems, then we can figure out the specific policies. that's where we can compromise and negotiate. but what i will not compromise on is the idea, for example, we shouldn't have 41 million people in this country without health insurance. that i won't compromise on. that's where it gets to who are we as a country and my own sense of what my responsibilities are as president of the united states. >> we're almost done. i have to ask you a little question you may not like to answer. this could be tough. the qualities required of a president. vice president joe biden, former secretary of state hillary clinton. compare and contrast. >> not a chance am i going there.

here's what i'll say. both hillary and joe would make outstanding presidents. and possess the qualities that are needed to be outstanding presidents. i think joe biden will go down in history as one of the best vice presidents ever. and he has been with me at my side in every tough decision that i've made from going after bin laden to dealing with the health care issues to you name it, he's been there. hillary i think will go down in history as one of the finest secretaries of state we've ever had. and help to transition us away from a deep hole that we were in when i first came into office around the world. and rebuild confidence and trust in the united states. and they've got different strengths, but both of them would be outstanding. i'd say the most important qualities of any president. i'm not necessarily saying i have these qualities because i'm speaking historically.

i think has to do with more than anything a sense of connection with the american people. that's what allows you then to have that second quality which is persistence. if you know who you're working on behalf of, if you remember as lincoln did or an fdr did or truman did or a kennedy did, if you remember that person you met who was down on their luck but was a good character and was trying to figure out how they are going to support a family. if you remember that young child who has big dreams but doesn't yet know how they're going to get to college. if you feel those folks in your gut every single day, that will get you through the setbacks and the difficulties and the frustrations and the criticisms that are inherent in the office.

and i think, you know, the interesting thing about now having been president for five years is it makes you humbler as opposed to cockier about what you as an individual can do. you recognize that you're just part of a sweep of history. and your job really is to push the envelope a little bit before somebody else pushes it up a little further and the task never stops at perfecting our union. but what makes me more confident than ever is the interactions i have with young people like this all over the country who still believe in this country, still are optimistic fundamentally about their futures, are problem solvers, are practical. the american people are good and

they are decent. and yes, sometimes we get very divided partly because our politics and our media specifically tries to divide them and splinter them, but we've got so much stuff going for us that as long as any president stays close to the people, i think they're going to do all right. >> what i always thought was great you did in your early political career. this just my personal observation. you lost that race to bobby rush and you got in your car and drove out in the burbs with a map next to you in the passenger seat and said i'm going to do this thing. how many kids here want to go into politics? >> that's a pretty good number. >> are they right? >> it continues to be a way to serve that i think can be noble. it's hard. it can be frustrating. you got to have a thick skin.

and i know it's tempting to say, you know what, why would i want to get in the mud like that and get slapped around and subjected to all kinds of scrutiny. and so for those people who say i'd rather serve in other ways through nonprofits or through starting a great business and work with people who are completely on my side all the time instead of trying to undermine what i'm trying to get done, i understand that. and god bless you. that's part of what makes this country great. you know, we're not completely government centered. we've got all kinds of folks who are doing great stuff all around the country. but i tell you, the satisfaction you get when you've passed a law or you've taken an executive action and somebody comes up to you and says, you know what?

my kid's alive because you passed that health care bill because he was uninsured. he got insurance, got a checkup, and we caught a tumor in time. or you see somebody and they say, you know, you helped me save my house. and i can't tell you what that means. it's pretty hard to get greater satisfaction than that. so for those young people who don't mind a little gray hair, it's something that i not only recommend but i'm welcome. >> on behalf of the people who watch me every night and are loyalists, many of them to you, thank you for coming on the show. >> great to see you, chris. thank you. [ applause ] [ applause ] ...are the hands that do good things for the whole community:

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we're back from american university on the "hardball" college tour. we just heard from the president. now here with joy reid, howard fineman, and of course david corn. each of you, i've just been chatting during the commercial break. it's obvious you heard things that i didn't hear. i want to start with howard because you grabbed me.

he's talking about rolling a boulder up the hill. he has a more mature view but a moral view. i thought he made the moral case for obama care. for you folks to consider obama care as a measure of community in mesh. that's what motivates barack obama. he knows its tough. the last 15 minutes of this video were extraordinary. i have never seen anything like it. the president unburdened himself to you about why he's in the ball game. and i thought he made a compelling case for his own decency. whatever the screw ups were manager alley, they were real. >> i felt like we saw two interviews with the president. in the first half you saw a man who was incredibly frustrated by what i think as he sees as the smallness of the debate in

washington. we don't talk about the big sweeping issues. frustrated incredibly and with the media. but in the second half i saw the guy that i first met in 2004 when he was essentially an activist attempting to use politics to move forward grand issues, grand themes. somebody in league or in line with the way the pope feels about social justice. you saw him stripped prp. >> why did that happen? is it bad poll numbers that first him into being i'm going to defend who i am. >> maybe it -- and i don't know if this is a negative spin on this. maybe because he feels even more frustrated, not to the point where he's giving up, he's

trying to figure out what he can do. he was very explanatory in this interview. not a lot of fight. there's still a lot of fights to be had. even about saving obama care. but it was really stunning to me. he talks about persistence and the connection between a president and the public and that motivating persistence. but that's different than fighting. >> why would he continue to fight. as i say, comparing politics to rolling a boulder up the hill is a little different from the way he began his life with popping a champagne cork. this is tough stuff. >> an african-american guy going to the suburbs. he doesn't have a gps. he has the map on the seat

saying i have to discover illinois. after being beaten in a south chicago race. >> excuse me me one second. the 2010 election. remember that? that was a tremendous blow. he recessed his presidency and how he could move forward and started emphasizing the the difference in values between him and republicans. when he says the government is us, that's like the grand slogan here. us because we come together to do the things. >> did you say the 180. people that try to restrict minority voting. they screw the voter it of voting. >> but he went back get together and do this collectively. he is looking beyond what the presidency itself can do and yearning for it. hoping people will recapture the sense of hope. he is completely samied by what's happening in washington. >> we are seeing a low point here. >> below 40%.

>> approval ratings are way down. three and a half years, as you say. what's the motivation? what are his goals? where is he heading. and i think you got a rare glimpse of how he is going to keep motivating himself as they move through this stuff political season. >> we'll be back with more from american university in just a minute. you're watching the "hardball" college tour, the place for politics. honestly? no way did i think a tablet was gonna be a good deal. you're talking to the guy who hasn't approved a new stapler purchase in three years. but then i saw the new windows tablet, with a real keyboard, usb port, and full office. it's a tablet that works for work. plus, it's got apps and games, for after hours, of course.

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it cleans, fights stains and brightens your clothes. so all that other stuff people use in the wash doesn't really hold its weight, does it? so try tide pods. why? the proof is in the pop. we're back from the american university here in washington, d.c. and the "hardball" college tour. i want to get a thought from you. bottom line for the president, what will you remember? >> his deep belief in social justice very much reflective of what the pope said. >> as soon as you mentioned pope francis the president remembered yet again why he is dealing with all the complexities. >> as opposed to rush limbaugh.

>> change you can believe in but making change is hard. >> he was called a marxist the other day. >> he remains frustrated and he is looking to rally students here and supporters and people within the media. >> he came to us today. >> he's trying to rally people behind this vision that he is promoting for a couple years. >> he did it. and he did it in the end not by defending specifics but explaining why he is in the game to begin with. i don't know about you. he's a professor. i don't know what you think. but i thought at the end it was extremely effective. >> he said you could go make money or something else and you won't have to be poked apart like i am. >> by the way he didn't oversell the politics thing. there's more than one way to serve. >> there's lots of good options out there. >> sounds like he was talking to

his sisters. thank you. that's "hardball" for now. and i want to thank everyone for being with us tonight here. and thank you to president obama of course for being our guest on the "hardball" college tour. and also to the american university for hosting us. good night. ice storm. a massive cold sweeps through a large part of the country. and it's not over. most parts will get hit with more. a live report next. back to work. making sense of the new jobs numbers. has the economy turned the corner when it comes to the economy. we'll hear from president bill clinton. motor city master pieces. the latest on possibly selling artwork opened by detroit. could it pull the city it of bankruptcy, and should it?